Fluid Nature of Online and Offline

Triangular relationships of personal online identity


There are three key interaction conditions in the identity processes: Fluid Nature of Online and Offline, overlapping social networks, and expectations of accuracy. Social actors accomplish the ideal-authentic balance through self-triangulation, presenting a coherent image in multiple arenas and through multiple media.


Online environments provide individuals with the ability to participate in virtual communities. Although geographically unconnected, they are united by common interests and shared cultural experiences. So cultural meanings of race, class, and gender flow into online identity.


Every social actor assumes a variety of roles, including those of mother, father, employee, friend, etc. Each character maintains a comprehensive understanding of others, or the standards and ethical expectations of the people that inhabit the world. Even while self-versions sometimes overlap, various networks may have slightly divergent, sometimes contradicting, expectations for players. One of the main complex factors in the network era is to bring together previously segmented networks.


It is customary for individuals to appropriately portray themselves on social networking platforms. By accurate, it does not imply a "True Self". Digitally mediated identity performance represents a specific version of the self, just like all other identity performance contexts.

In different contexts[edit]

Blogging[edit]

As blogs allow an individual to express his or her views in individual essays or as part of a wider discussion, it creates a public forum for expressing ideas. Bloggers often choose to use pseudonyms, whether in platforms such as WordPress or in interest-centered blog sites, to protect personal information and allow them more editorial freedom to express ideas that might be unpopular with their family, employers, etc. Use of a pseudonym (and a judicious approach to revealing personal information) can allow a person to protect their real identities, but still build a reputation online using the assumed name.[12]

Human resources[edit]

Digital identity management has become a necessity when applying for jobs while working for a company. Social media has been a tool for human resources for years. A KPMG report on social media in human resources say that 76 percent of American companies used LinkedIn for recruiting.[13] The ease of search means that reputation management will become more vital especially in professional services such as lawyers, doctors and accountants.

Social networks[edit]

Online social networks like Facebook and MySpace allow people to maintain an online identity with some overlap between online and real-world context. These identities are often created to reflect a specific aspect or ideal version of themselves. Representations include pictures, communications with other 'friends' and membership in network groups. Privacy control settings on social networks are also part of social networking identity.[14]


Some users may use their online identity as an extension of their physical selves, and center their profiles around realistic details. These users value continuity in their identity, and would prefer being honest with the portrayal of themselves. However, there is also a group of social network users that would argue against using a real identity online. These users have experimented with online identity, and ultimately what they have found is that it is possible to create an alternate identity through the usage of such social networks. For example, a popular blogger on medium.com[15] writes under the name of Kel Campbell – a name that was chosen by her, not given to her. She states that when she was verbally attacked online by another user, she was able to protect herself from the sting of the insult by taking it as Kel, rather than her true self. Kel became a shield of sorts, and acted as a mask that freed the real user beneath it.


Research from scientists such as danah boyd and Knut Lundby has found that in some cultures, the ability to form an identity online is considered a sacred privilege. This is because having an online identity allows the user to accomplish things that otherwise are impossible to do in real life. These cultures believe that the self has become a subjective concept on the online spaces; by logging onto their profiles, users are essentially freed from the prison of a physical body and can "create a narrative of the self in virtual space that may be entirely new".

Online business[edit]

In the development of social networks, there has appeared a new economic phenomenon: doing business via social networks. For example, there are many users of WeChat called wei-businessmen (Wechat businessman, a new form of e-commerce in Wechat) who sell products on WeChat. Doing business via social networks is not that easy. The identities of users in social networks are not the same as that in the real world. For the sake of security, people do not tend to trust someone in social networks, in particular when it is related with money. So for wei-businessmen, reputations are very important for wei-business. Once customers decide to shop via Wechat, they prefer to choose those wei-businessmen with high reputations. They need to invest enormous efforts to gain reputations among the users of WeChat, which in turn increases the chance other users will purchase from them.

Benefits and concerns[edit]

Benefits[edit]

A discussed positive aspect of virtual communities is that people can present themselves without fear of persecution, whether it is personality traits, behaviors that they are curious about, or the announcement of a real world identity component that has never before been announced. This freedom results in new opportunities for society as a whole, especially the ability for people to explore the roles of gender and sexuality in a manner that can be harmless, yet interesting and helpful to those undertaking the change. Online identity has given people the opportunity to feel comfortable in wide-ranging roles, some of which may be underlying aspects of the user's life that the user is unable to portray in the real world.[23]


Online identity has a beneficial effect for minority groups, including racial and ethnic minority populations and people with disabilities. Online identities may help remove prejudices created by stereotypes found in real life, and thus provide a greater sense of inclusion.


One example of these opportunities is the establishment of many communities welcoming LGBTQ+ teenagers who are learning to understand their sexuality. These communities allow teenagers to share their experiences with one another or other older members of the LGBTQ+ community, and provide both a non-threatening and non-judgmental safe place. In a review of such a community, Silberman quotes an information technology worker, Tom Reilly, as stating: "The wonderful thing about online services is that they are an intrinsically decentralized resource. Kids can challenge what adults have to say and make the news".[24] If teen organizers are successful anywhere, news of it is readily available. The Internet is arguably the most powerful tool that young people with alternative sexualities have ever had.[25]


The online world provides users with a choice to determine which sex, sexuality preference and sexual characteristics they would like to embody. In each online encounter, a user essentially has the opportunity to interchange which identity they would like to portray.[26] As McRae argues in Surkan (2000), "The lack of physical presence and the infinite malleability of bodies complicates sexual interaction in a singular way: because the choice of gender is an "option" rather than a strictly defined biological characteristic, the entire concept of gender as a primary marker of identity becomes partially subverted."


Online identity can offer potential social benefits to those with physical and sensory disabilities. The flexibility of online media provides control over their disclosure of impairment, an opportunity not typically available in real world social interactions.[27] Researchers highlight its value in improving inclusion. However, the affordance of normalization offers the possibility of experiencing non-stigmatized identities while also offering the capacity to create harmful and dangerous outcomes, which may jeopardize participants' safety.[28]

Concerns[edit]

Primarily, concerns regarding virtual identity revolve around the areas of misrepresentation and the contrasting effects of on and offline existence. Sexuality and sexual behavior online provide some of the most controversial debate with many concerned about the predatory nature of some users. This is particularly in reference to concerns about child pornography and the ability of pedophiles to obscure their identity.[29]


The concerns regarding the connection between on and offline lives have challenged the notions of what constitutes a real experience. In reference to gender, sexuality and sexual behavior, the ability to play with these ideas has resulted in a questioning of how virtual experience may affect one's offline emotions. As McRae states, virtual sex not only complicates but drastically unsettles the division between mind, body, and self that has become a comfortable truism in Western metaphysics. When projected into virtuality, mind, body and self all become consciously manufactured constructs through which individuals interact with each other.[30]

Disembodiment and implications[edit]

This issue of gender and sexual reassignment raises the notion of disembodiment and its associated implications. "Disembodiment" is the idea that once the user is online, the need for the body is no longer required, and the user can participate separately from it. This ultimately relates to a sense of detachment from the identity defined by the physical body. In cyberspace, many aspects of sexual identity become blurred and are only defined by the user. Questions of truth will therefore be raised, particularly in reference to online dating and virtual sex. As McRae states, "Virtual sex allows for a certain freedom of expression, of physical presentation and of experimentation beyond one's own real-life limits".[30] At its best, it not only complicates but drastically unsettles the division between mind, body and self in a manner only possible through the construction of an online identity.

Legal and security issues[edit]

Online identity and user's rights[edit]

The future of online anonymity depends on how an identity management infrastructure is developed.[41] Law enforcement officials often express their opposition to online anonymity and pseudonymity, which they view as an open invitation to criminals who wish to disguise their identities. Therefore, they call for an identity management infrastructure that would irrevocably tie online identity to a person's legal identity; in most such proposals, the system would be developed in tandem with a secure national identity document. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, has stated that the Google+ social network is intended to be exactly such an identity system.[42] The controversy resulting from Google+'s policy of requiring users to sign in using legal names has been dubbed the "nymwars".[43]


Online civil rights advocates, in contrast, argue that there is no need for a privacy-invasive system because technological solutions, such as reputation management systems, are already sufficient and are expected to grow in their sophistication and utility.

The market[edit]

An online identity that has acquired an excellent reputation is valuable for two reasons: first, one or more persons invested a great deal of time and effort to build the identity's reputation; and second, other users look to the identity's reputation as they try to decide whether it is sufficiently trustworthy. It is therefore unsurprising that online identities have been put up for sale at online auction sites. However, conflicts arise over the ownership of online identities. Recently, a user of a massively multiplayer online game called EverQuest, which is owned by Sony Online Entertainment, Inc., attempted to sell his EverQuest identity on eBay. Sony objected, asserting that the character is Sony's intellectual property, and demanded the removal of the auction; under the terms of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), eBay could have become a party to a copyright infringement lawsuit if it failed to comply.

European Centre for Reputation Studies